Infinite Impossibilities
by skeletonfishpunk
Summary: A look into what could have happened in a world where parallel destinies cross and roles reverse.
1. Part 1 - Revelations

Infinite Impossibilities

Part 1

            Raziel clung to himself and squeezed his eyes shut tighter, trying to swallow the burning lump in his throat. He had lain like this for hours, or days, millennia. It didn't matter; all time became an endless parade of blackness and pain.

                Very slowly Raziel realised that he was becoming aware of his surroundings. He was not, as he had previously thought, free-floating in the endless sea of the Abyss. He lay spread-eagled on his back on a hard, black obsidian floor, gazing up at a ceiling too high to contemplate. Obsidian ornamentation covered the otherwise plain black walls, etchings in a language he didn't comprehend scrawled their way around them.

                Exerting a great effort to raise himself with both hands, Raziel the Fallen sat up and put one clawed hand to his forehead, eyes shut. Finally he brought himself to study his impossibly changed body. His skin, once a vision in marble, was a deep blue, and he soon discovered that his lower jaw had been rent from him completely. Bone and muscle and flesh had seemingly melded into some new, tougher substance, though his ribs and spine remained largely exposed. After studying himself for an unknown amount of time, Raziel steeled himself, a set determination in his eyes, and stood up. Picking up the remnants of his banner-like cloak, he slung it over his shoulders, partially covering his scarred face, and started to walk towards a large, dark opening in one of the obsidian walls.

*

                This place is quite obviously deep underground, thought Raziel, taking in his surroundings as he continued to walk on silent feet along a gently winding corridor. Ahead of him he could make out a gently throbbing red light seeping from a small doorway. He slowed his pace, warily bending slightly to see into the room before he entered. The red light threw a strange cast on everything in the surprisingly small, low-ceilinged room. Raziel stepped inside and was struck by the silence that was latent in the air of this confined space. The light had no apparent source, so Raziel began to study the walls once more. They were made of the same smooth, almost reflective obsidian, and there were inscriptions and drawings covering the entire surface. He traced a claw over a short sequence of pictures, showing various beings in torment and chaos, and one solid, unchanging figure always standing over them in the background, ever-present in a world full of malice and confusion. He frowned, moving onto the next wall.

"Im glad you appreciate my saga." A deceptively soft voice came from behind Raziel. He spun around, feet spread solidly, ready to fight. A vaguely humanoid shape of projected red light spread across the whole wall. Raziel lowered his hands slightly.

"Who are you? Where am I?" He asked, finding he could easily speak even without the use of his lower jaw. The figure appeared to shake slightly, in laughter or perhaps simply because of its flimsy projection.

"You are in my domain." It simply said. "I have summoned you here from your eternal torment in the abyss to offer you a choice." The voice resonated around the small room. Raziel raised one eyebrow in a quizzical look, and finally abandoned his defensive stance.

"What kind of choice." He said. "Torment me not with false promises, whatever you are. Send me back to my peaceful, everlasting death."

The red light figure grew immensely, seemingly filling the entire room with its presence. It towered over Raziel, and he took a step back instinctively.

"I admire your spirit, Raziel." It intoned. "But, know that though I offer you a choice to be made of your own free will, your fate is pre-ordained."

Raziel laughed bitterly. "Then what kind of choice is it you offer me, that I may make of free will and yet be guided in my decision by cruel destiny?" he asked. The being remained silent for a moment, and then shrunk slightly, back to its original size. The high pressure in the small room abated slightly.

"It is a simple choice, Raziel. I am offering you the chance to create an entirely new, parallel yet ultimately different destiny than the one that you are already hurtling towards." The voice paused, as if taking breath. "Become my agent, Raziel." The voice was deep and clipped, and the silence that followed rung in Raziel's ears in the small room. "Become my Angel of Death, my… Soul Reaver, and avert the course that history is forcing you to take which will only lead in inevitable death."

Raziel frowned again, serious questions nagging at him that he felt were better not to ask at the present moment. He waited for the being to continue.

"Even now you try to redeem yourself in your head for your betrayal of your brethren." The voice said solemnly, and then broke into sudden, chilling laughter. "There is no need for you to create a fiction of your own righteousness for your personal use!"

Raziel clenched his fists and raised one of them at the red light being.

"My brethren suffered no betrayal from mine own hands!" He exclaimed loudly. "_I_ was the one who suffered at their unmerciful hands for a crime with went uncommitted." The red light being continued to chuckle softly.

"I find it highly amusing how you have deluded yourself into thinking, in those many eons you cowered in the "Abyss", oblivious to all around you, that you are some kind of _martyr_!" The projection shook with violent laughter. "Very well. I shall grace you with the story of your own history, which you have neatly erased from your mind while you basked in insanity. Do you not remember wreaking an arcane contract with a bloodthirsty spirit that if you slaughtered huge ranks of your vampire kinsmen to fuel the needs of this spirit, that you would be granted power over your equals?" The being appeared to be regarding Raziel with amusement as he stumbled back against the obsidian wall opposite the projection, eyes wild.

"Do you not remember massacring your brothers in the name of this nameless spirit, and revelling in the power it fed to you? Do you not remember Kain, your sire, finding you drinking the blood of one of your own brothers, and in deep pity, not ordering the execution of his first-born, but ordering your confinement? Have you forgotten the millennia you spent chained to the pillars of Nosgoth, under constant solemn watch by your kin, while you raved and slowly drove yourself insane?" The voice trailed off, leaving Raziel taking ragged breaths as he pressed himself up against the wall, shaking his head.

"No, you lie… I was outcast for being favoured; Kain was jealous-" he broke off, inhaling loudly. The voice was silent, though Raziel could see it shaking in silent laughter.

"Become mine, Raziel, lest you take up the path your destiny is painting for you and Kain slays you in the name of all things holy."

Raziel took another deep breath, and stepped forward again, regaining his composure as much as he found possible.

"What is it that you wish me to do?" he asked warily.

"You will slay Kain and restore balance to the world. My balance." Raziel inclined his head slightly. 'My' balance? He thought.

"I see you will need some educating. Right at this very moment, my peer, my most hated other half, speaks unto Kain as I speak unto you. Kain is assuming his destined role as the guardian of balance in the name of my other half. You will assume the role of my Soul Reaver, and you shall put Kain back in his place and restore Nosgoth and its inhabitants to their rightful role, as the purveyors of evil! The Kindred have long slipped in their duties; they have grown negligent of their origins and purposes. Kain is the culmination of millennia of tampering by my other half. Vampires doing things in the name of nobility and balance, indeed!" The voice grew louder and louder, and Raziel was forced to clamp his hands over his ears as the resonating voice boomed in the tiny room. He screwed his eyes shut in an attempt to evade the towering animosity emanating from this projection. The voice paused, and continued in a quieter and more composed tone.

"The Kindred are not elements of order and neutrality. They are my children, children of chaos and disorder, of evil and power. My other half has tampered long enough, and has corrupted my children of chaos. I did not intend them to exist in harmony with all, for harmony to exist there must also be chaos and corruption." The voice seemed to sigh. "And so, Raziel, wilt thou take up the gauntlet?"

Raziel put a hand to his forehead and closed his eyes again. This was too much to take, he needed time to process everything this being was trying to tell him.

"DOST THOU ACCEPT THY DESTINY, RAZIEL!" The voice thundered, the force throwing Raziel against the wall. He crumpled to the ground and pushed himself up, trembling, with both hands. He no longer cared for anything, and turning back to the projection, eyes blazing red in the light, he ripped his makeshift cloak from his body and tossed it on the floor.

"I accept." He said, and the projection vanished, plunging Raziel into utter darkness.


	2. Part 2 - Elevation

Infinite Impossibilities

Part 2

                Raziel came to in a dimly lit chamber that he didn't recognise. The walls were not of the obsidian to which he had grown accustomed, but instead they were of a dark, translucent glass. Etchings roved across the walls and ceiling as they had done in the other rooms Raziel had studied before his meeting with the red light being, some detailed depictions of demonic angels, and some simply scrawls in an incoherent tongue.

                After studying his environment, Raziel moved to get up and find a way out of this room. However, he found that his arms and legs were bound in the same smoky glass material that the walls were constructed from. He struggled for a minute or two, but soon discovered that he was wasting his energy. The glass bindings locked his hands behind his back and his feet to the floor in front of him, rendering him helpless.

                In the half-darkness, Raziel reflected on all that the being had told him. He was so utterly familiar with what he had up until now _known_ was his past history, but now he wasn't so convinced. The more he thought about it, snatches of conversation and split-second still images surfaced in his memory, or what he believed to be his memory. Raziel shook his head violently to try and dislodge the images flooding him, not knowing who or what to believe.

A snatch of conversation.

"I will not have him live among us! He is an outcast, no longer one of our kind."

"And I will not have my first-born lieutenant cast into the Abyss!"

"He is deluded, he killed scores of his own kind and drank their blood!"

"Confine him to the pillars. I shall personally watch over him day and night, but I shall not have him slain."

An image, a badly lit sketch of a life which may or may not have come to pass. Raziel, crouched over a fallen Vampire wearing the mark of the Razielim. Raziel, holding the Kindred up by a fistful of cloak, one clawed hand suspended in midair, poised to deliver the fatal blow. A trickle of dark blood traces a line from the corner of Raziel's mouth to his chin.

                Raziel closed his eyes, instinctively trying to raise his hands to cover his face, willing the image to go away. His body convulsed at the thought of drinking his brother's blood, and he took deep breaths to calm himself. For an indeterminable amount of time he sat in the near-darkness, staring at the wall opposite him, until his sharp ears picked up a sound nearby. Her struggled to turn around, twisting his neck as far as possible. But this time the voice came from in front of him.

"Its time for you to assume your role, Raziel."

Raziel's head snapped around to look for the source of the voice, and this time it was no mere projection. A dark figure, immense and solid, stood some way off towards the far wall. Raziel recognised the figure from the images he had inspected on the wall of the small room where he accepted his destiny – the immovable and ageless solemn figure which stood observing what Raziel now knew to be his children's work.

Raziel struggled once more with his bindings, and he was suddenly released from them. Standing up he brushed himself off and took a few steps towards the dark figure. Before he was halfway across the room, he was stopped in his tracks by an unseen force. Involuntarily, his arms extended and his feet were drawn together as if in a morbid parody of a crucifixion.

                Suddenly a thirst hit Raziel like one he'd never experienced before. His whole body was aflame with it, burning white hot in his mind's eye. He threw back his head, eyes closed, trying to think of something other than the blinding pain.

"And now art thou awakened." The voice intoned once again using that archaic speech. All of a sudden Raziel was released by the force which held him, and he collapsed to the cold glass floor, choking and gasping for breath.

"What...What have you done to me?" He bit out, head in his hands.

"I have simply altered your tastes to something more fitting for the services you will be performing." The voice answered. "You no longer have the lust or the need for blood as you have always known. Your being is elevated, but in that state you need something more substantial to sustain your ethereal body. Now must you gorge yourself on the souls of others, and they will strengthen you beyond your physical limits."

Raziel pushed himself back up and held out his clawed hands in front of him. He regarded them for a moment and then let them drop to his sides as his gaze slid up to regard the figure.

"You know your purpose." Were the only words the figure had for the Fallen Raziel. The figure remained cold and silent as Raziel steeled himself and pushed past it, striding out into the corridor beyond.

                The faint light of the room ahead beckoned to Raziel, and he swept into it with resolve. A lone soul, shrieking soundlessly, trailed around the room. Raziel instinctively set his feet slightly apart, and willed the soul towards him. He devoured it without knowing how, a strange inhalation full of promise. He realised that he didn't feel as shaky now, and glanced around the room. Various pieces of armour were hanging from the walls or standing on racks. After a quick glance, Raziel selected some rudimentary pieces and threw them on before sweeping out of the room and onwards, towards the pillars where he was confined for so long.

                Pausing at an intersection, Raziel closed his eyes, brushing his hair back absently with one hand.

A snippet of conversation.

"Cast him in."

An image, of crystal clarity, and then gone in a flash. Raziel, suspended unconscious by two of his Kindred, being roughly dragged to the edge of the Abyss, Kain standing by, watching with a suppressed smile of triumph on his scarred face.

                Raziel spun around, eyes flashing with anger. But before he could stride back to the domain of the figure and the voice, all-new purpose came to him and he remembered that they were false memories conjured up by the delirium that he himself had immersed himself in to escape from the bleak reality.

                Clenching his clawed fists tightly, Raziel set his face in an expression of fierce determination, and began his silent march towards the pillars of Nosgoth, and his awaiting destiny.


	3. Part 3 - Confrontation

Infinite Impossibilities

**Part 3**

****

                As Raziel neared the pillars, a tight feeling began to form in his chest, and walking became more difficult, as if he were struggling through quicksand. He slowed to a crawling pace, pushing hard against the invisible force holding him back with all his strength. Then, as he found he could proceed no further, the voice came to him again.

"The Spectral Plane cannot support you any further in this place. Will your being into the Physical Plane!"

                Raziel ceased struggling against the immense force pressing him back, and spread his arms wide. Never having done this before, he hesitated, but the voice didn't give him any further instruction. Tentatively, he willed his body to cross planes. A surging wind took hold of him, and his surroundings blurred. Raziel was overwhelmed with dizziness, and he doubled over, trying not to be violently sick. When the wind abated, Raziel looked up and saw that his surroundings were the same, and yet at the same time completely different. Having been in the Spectral Plane, he found that he now saw things differently in this world.

                Resuming his striding pace towards the pillars, Raziel discovered that his walking was no longer laboured. The pillars came into view ahead of him, still standing as he remembered them in his fragmented memory.

                Before he set foot on the slightly raised platform upon which the pillars stood, he walked around the area, slowly taking in the similarities and the differences between his mental picture and the reality. With a slight jolt, Raziel's gaze slid over the heavy metal shackles lying shattered on the floor in the centre of the semicircle of pillars. He stepped up onto the platform and crouched down beside the remnants, absently touching them with one clawed hand. Fragments of what must have been an immense stone block to which the shackles were attached were flung in a wide range around the pillars.

                Raziel closed his eyes solemnly. Is it really true what the voice told me? Am I really a savage, unmerciful bringer of death, a killer of my own brothers? He thought to himself. Straining his memory to the limits, a memory surfaced from the swirling mists that obscured his full recollection of his past.

"Look at him. He is no longer a Kindred but a raving madman. We would be removing a burden from our kind if we killed him."

"Kain would have us cast into the Abyss. Do you not know that this is his first-born? We were assigned to guard Raziel, not to bestow any kind of judgement upon him."

Straining against his shackles, Raziel bared his fangs and hissed at the two fledglings standing over him as if they had the right to speak any assessment of him. Feet scraping against the stone floor, attempting to stand, a deep growl started in the back of Raziel's throat as he pushed his back against the stone block to which he had been bound for longer than he could remember. Giving up, he relaxed against the cold stone, breathing heavily as he eyed the two guards from half-lidded eyes that seethed with anger.

                Raziel was suddenly jerked out of this vivid memory when he sensed the familiar presence of his sire. Standing and turning round in one fluid movement, he regarded Kain with his new insight, studying him in a light that he had not before been aware of.

                Kain stood solidly some distance away, arms folded across his broad chest, expression grave and solemn. Raziel spread his feet firmly on the ground in a defensive stance, and raised his hands slightly. Kain returned his lieutenant's gaze nonchalantly.

"And you have returned to me." He said in a soft voice. Raziel remained still and silent as Kain began to pace slowly towards him, stepping up onto the platform.

"Have you come here to slay me?" Kain asked in a bored voice, letting his arms drop to his sides. Raziel stood silently, eyes flashing, regarding his sire for a moment. Lightning-fast, he struck out at Kain with a clawed hand, jumping forward in an effort to catch Kain a glancing blow to the face. Kain responded quickly, sliding to one side, and Raziel pursued with a series of aimed blows in quick succession.

"You have corrupted our kind!" Raziel bellowed, still working to get past Kain's parrying. Kain was being driven backwards as he fought off Raziel's attack, and he kept glancing behind to make sure he didn't back himself into a corner.

"I have refined them!" Kain responded. "We were nothing more than scavengers before I civilised and united them!" Raziel steeled himself and leapt at Kain, crashing into him and pushing him up against one of the tall pillars. He encircled Kain's neck with his claws, bringing his face close to that of his sire. Raziel raised his other hand, claws poised.

"You would have us at peace with the humans? They are nothing but meat! They are not worthy of our time! You would have us as a united force? Then why do we fight among ourselves still!" He cried. Kain pressed his hands against Raziel's chest, trying to force him away.

"Your confusion will be the death of you, Raziel!" He said, a bitter smile lighting his scarred face. "You have always acted upon the smallest force of influence that catches you, haven't you? Even now you're devoting all your energy to act out this part, urged on by the influence wielded by an entity you don't even comprehend!" With that, Kain raised one foot and kicked Raziel from him, sending the Fallen One to the stone platform. Kain strode over to his first-born, and placed one foot lightly but threateningly on Raziel's chest to keep him down before his sire. Raziel struggled, trying to get free, a burning expression of hatred written across his face.

                Kain then drew the sword that was at his hip, a monstrosity of twisted metal, and laid the tip gently against Raziel's throat.

"I have spared you once from the fate which any other of my kin would have been condemned to for your heinous acts. However, this must not go unpunished. You have truly outlived your place beside me, Raziel."

                Raziel drew a deep breath, and in the silence which crouched over the pair, the voice came to him again.

"Raziel, I give you the instrument with which to become my demonic angel!"

                Raziel felt again the tight feeling in his chest, and Kain was thrown to the floor. The two Vampires pushed themselves up, and Kain once again took up his sword. Raziel stood by, waiting for the act of the voice to happen. All of a sudden, Raziel's right arm was drawn upwards, claws spread and palm facing Kain. The sword in Kain's hand seemed to respond in much the same way, and it began to throb with a dull red light. Raziel struggled to keep his balance as his arm pulled him forward, and bracing himself against the force, he held onto his right arm with his other hand. Kain was acting in much the same way, holding onto the sword now with both hands.

                At once, the red light shot from the sword and connected both Kindred with a beam of intense red light. The light coiled around Raziel's lower arm, and he cried out in pain. Kain's eyes were wide, uncomprehending. After several long moments of searing pain, the connection between the two weapons was severed, and they were separate. Raziel clutched at his right arm, gasping for breath. The spirit of Kain's sword coiled and shifted around his arm. Raziel flexed the claws of his right hand, and then launched himself at Kain with a cry. The Soul Reaver lengthened and drove through the air blazing a red trail behind it, halting with a shrieking crash against its twin blade as Kain moved to parry Raziel's attack.

"Don't let your mind be dominated, Raziel," he said between blows. "This is not where, or how, its supposed to happen!" Taking a large step back, Kain shimmered and blurred, and then vanished.

                Raziel stood for a long time staring at the spot where Kain had stood. Absently, he touched his right arm, and the light of the spirit blade swirled and eddied around his claws. Frowning, Raziel regarded the weapon of destruction now permanently a part of him, a dark parasite feeding off his very soul.


	4. Part 4 - Realisation

Infinite Impossibilities

Part 4

                Raziel sat for a long time, until well after nightfall turned the clearing where the pillars of Nosgoth stood into a surreal landscape full of shadows. He sat upon the chipped remnants of the slab to which he had been bound, head bowed, arms resting on his thighs. The spirit sword twisted and flowed upon his lower right arm, and it awakened a deep anger in Raziel. As much as he wanted to rend this thing from him, cast it away and be free of it, he knew that it was now as much a part of him as any limb. He stretched his arm out in front of him and clenched his fist experimentally. The Soul Reaver responded by flaring up slightly, glowing brightly red. He spread his claws and allowed the spirit blade to flow out from his palm, a shadow of the material blade, twisted and translucent.

                As Raziel sat, he contemplated everything that Kain had said to him. While he had been fighting with his sire, he had not stopped to take note of anything that had been said, so infused with blinding anger as he had been at the time. Now he reflected upon the events that had taken place recently.

                Brought on by Kain's words, Raziel began to doubt the words of the voice once more, and suspicion arose in his mind. Once more he strained his mind to show him the correct memories. Kain had told him not to let his mind be dominated, and Raziel knew that, hard as it would be, he would have to find the truth within himself.

A memory surfaced:

                Raziel entered the throne room with his characteristic long stride, and knelt before his sire and his brothers, inclining his head. Kain raised an eyebrow and stood, motioning for Raziel to follow suit. Raziel stood, and encouraged by his sire, flared his wings. Kain's expression was intense and yet unreadable as he slowly circled around his first-born lieutenant, touching the wings slightly with his claws, making Raziel flinch instinctively. Raziel felt the cold claws rake across the leathery surface of his wings, and he knew before that it would happen even before Kain brought his claws down and tore the bones from Raziel's body, leaving him broken and bloody on the floor.

                Raziel screwed his eyes shut, bringing his hands to cover his face. He stood and threw his head back, giving vent with a harsh cry.

"Why have you _done_ this to me!" He shouted to the voice, not knowing if the voice could hear him, let alone know what had happened. He spun around and aimed a kick at the stone block, shattering it completely, the pieces skittering across the stone platform. When he turned around, the figure was standing some distance ahead of him, wreathed in shadow, immovable as a mountain. Raziel growled.

"You have betrayed me, you did not speak the truth of what happened to me." He said calmly. The figure remained still, but it somehow appeared to be closer. Raziel realised that he had never noticed features in that blank face, nor could he see limbs individually. The figure appeared to be no more real than a humanoid statue crafted of shiny black obsidian.

"Raziel, you betray yourself. You still cling to the story you crafted in your insanity and then lovingly drew around you to block out all memory of your misdeeds." The voice intoned from the figure. Raziel clenched his fist, the Soul Reaver blazing into bright fire, trailing tails of bright red light as Raziel moved his hand in a wide gesture.

"It is you who has crafted a story for my benefit!" Raziel roared. The figure chuckled.

"You are wasting your time, Raziel. Let go of these false dreams and concentrate on your task, before its too late. Even now, Kain is in reprieve in the chamber of my hated other half. Do not waste this opportunity, my Soul Reaver; for this is the window of opportunity to right the course history is taking. Dispose of your sire, and of my tampering other half, before he upsets the balance so deeply against our favour that we may no longer right this wrong."

                Raziel hesitated, confusion rearing its head in his mind. Who should he believe? As he stood defensively, another memory seemed to loom large in his mind, seemingly from out of nowhere.

Raziel reclined on his throne in the stronghold of the Razielim, one leg nonchalantly bent over the arm of the stone chair. In his right hand he held a goblet from which he was drinking dark blood. Before him lay the crumpled body of a Razielim Vampire, blood pooling underneath it. A voice echoed in the large room.

"Raziel, thou hast not done all I have asked of ye." The voice was incredibly loud, and seemed to come from the room itself. Raziel, seated on his stone throne, assumed a bored expression and toyed with the blood in his goblet, tipping it and letting it run up the sides.

"I have given unto thee powers the like of which ye could not comprehend. However, thou hast not yet repaid me." The voice said patiently. Raziel laughed loudly.

"Begone, demon, I have no further use for you." He said softly, standing up and tossing the goblet to one side, where it shattered on the floor, leaving an almost black bloodstain spattered across the wall. With that, Raziel turned to walk out of the room.

"Nay, Raziel, thou shalt not betray me like this. Though I cannot remove these powers I have delivered unto thee, I shall make it so thou art unable to use them!" The voice screeched, stopping Raziel in his tracks. He turned to face the room again, but before he had made more than a half-turn, insanity struck him. He clutched at his head, dropping to his knees on the ground, shrieking loudly. He wasn't even aware of Kain's arrival, nor of the fledglings that carried him bodily to the pillars and attached the shackles he would wear for eons.

                Raziel gaped, staring at the figure in incomprehension. The memory was so vivid that all doubt had been erased from his mind, and he dropped the defensive stance he had been taking against the figure.

"Ahh. I see you are coming to your senses." The voice said softly. Then the figure was gone, between the space of one thought and the next, and Raziel was left alone.

                He did not stop to ponder further on these memories. There was no longer any doubt left in his mind that Kain was the one lying to him, the one trying to plant ideas in his mind. Raziel realised that he would have to steel himself against Kain's comments when next they met. He turned around and started walking in a long stride towards the stronghold.

                In front of the gates, Raziel encountered one of the Kindred guards. They blocked the gateway, and politely asked him to identify himself and state his business. Without slowing his stride, Raziel cut them down with the Soul Reaver and continued his relentless march towards Kain's throne room.

                When he reached the room in which he had stood at Kain's right hand so many times in the past, he found the place deserted, it looked as if no one had used this particular room in many years. Inhaling deeply, Raziel wondered where to look for his sire. In a sudden flash of inspiration, he knew where to go. Seeing that the doors had been bolted, Raziel dug his claws into one of the buttresses, and began to climb up to the first floor gallery. He glanced down through a pane-less window to the courtyard below, and finding it deserted, he dropped silently into it.

                The doors to the temple were as old as the temple itself, and they put up an audible protest when Raziel shouldered them open. The hallways were musty and unlit, but the Soul Reaver coiled around Raziel's arm emitted enough soft red light to guide his way.

                A dim blue light spilled from the small gap between a door and its frame, and Raziel instinctively entered, pushing the heavy stone door open with one hand. The sight that met him made him draw back slightly, but he recovered himself and strode into the large room, letting the door shut behind him.

                Kain turned and met his first-born's gaze, but said nothing as Raziel padded softly towards the centre of the room.

"Welcome, Raziel the Fallen." The elder god's voice intoned.


	5. Part 5 - Destination

Infinite Impossibilities

Part 5

                Raziel made a cursory glance around the room, taking in the soft blue glow that emanated from a tapering point in the ceiling's centre, the source of the ethereal voice. Kain stood with his hands folded across his chest, steadily gazing at his lieutenant turned traitor.

"What is this, Kain?" Raziel asked in a bored voice, motioning to the blue taper with one hand. "The 'father of Vampires' following orders from an obscure source that go against the very nature of his kind?" Kain's expression hardened, but he did not retort. Instead, the voice, unimaginably different from the voice from which Raziel's own orders came, replied in his stead.

"How foolish you are to allow my resentful brother to fill your head with twisted visions. I had thought that you had a stronger will, Raziel, that you knew too well who you were to allow him to corrupt you."

                Raziel frowned, looking up into the gently glowing blue taper, one fist clenched. Then his gaze slid back to Kain. He spread his feet, making a dry sound on the rough floor, and flicked his right wrist slightly, willing the Soul Reaver to flow from his palm and form its ethereal blade. Kain, silent and committed, also adopted a fighting stance, drawing the Soul Reaver's twin, physically manifest blade with a steely ring. The two foes stood less than a metre apart, regarding each other clinically. Neither moved.

"Kain! Refrain from this rashness!" The voice of the Elder God boomed throughout the temple. "It is not your destiny to slay Raziel!" Kain did not break eye contact with his first-born, however, and neither did he lower his sword.

"Raziel! If you have the faintest will to live you with put down thy weapon and stand back. I will not permit you to act this way in the domain of a God!" Raziel eyed his opponent steadily, the light of the Soul Reaver throbbing a dull red against the blue background of the temple.

                With an unearthly clash, the two foes brought their weapons together, and bright sparks showered from the two blades that were one and the same. Their faces not far from one another as they both struggled to fend off the other's brutal attack, they exchanged glances that spoke volumes of what they felt for each other.

                Taking a large step back, Raziel launched a new attack, swinging his weapon in a wide arc to attempt a blow at Kain's sword-arm. Kain parried badly, and was driven back against a wall of the temple. Raziel put as much power as he could into his forward thrust, but Kain ducked out from under his child's arm and swung around behind him, lashing out with his sword. Raziel turned in time to leap over Kain's blade, and landed roughly on the floor some distance away. Taking a different form of attack, Raziel aimed a kick which caught Kain under the chin, knocking him to the ground.

                Kain raised his blade in front of his face, expecting a blow from the Soul Reaver. However, Raziel instead stooped over his sire and lifted him roughly with one clawed hand clutching a handful of his cloak. With his other hand, he raised the Soul Reaver and brought it close to Kain's cheek, eyes boring into that of his former master. However, before he could execute a downward slash to slay Kain, he let go of his sire and staggered back, clutching his left shoulder with his right hand. Dark blood spattered onto the temple floor from a gash in his shoulder, and Kain pushed himself up, his sword dripping the same blood in a small trail on the ground.

"Never leave an enemy armed when you have him at your mercy." Kain intoned in a serious voice as he advanced on Raziel.

                Raziel glared, eyes blazing. With a harsh cry, he leapt at Kain so fast that he didn't know it was coming, and with a vicious slash, tore open his sire's chest. They fell to the ground, Kain's sword skittering across the polished floor and out of his reach, with Raziel kneeling astride him, claws clenched around his neck and the Soul Reaver poised to deliver a fatal blow.

"That's ENOUGH!" The voice of the Elder God boomed, loud enough to make both Vampires flinch at the force. "It is about time, Raziel, that you put an end to this idiocy and bent your will to the real task set out for you. You have been deceived, child of Kain. The voice you hear urging you on, the figure you see standing over you when you work his deeds, is that of my brother. We are Elder Gods, we have no names. Know only that he stands for chaos and the ultimate destruction of the universe as it was intended, and I for continuity of life."

                Raziel listened absently, but did not loose his hold upon Kain. His sire regarded him from his prone position, breathing heavily. The voice of the Elder God continued.

"He has planted ideas and motivations in your head to persuade you to slay Kain and attempt to slay me, that he would have the task to himself to alter the course of things as he sees fit."

"Why me!" Raziel cried out suddenly, arms still locked in position, restraining Kain.

"Because he is aware of the fact that you are the only person who could accomplish such a feat." The voice said simply.

                Raziel shook his head slightly, and tightened his grip on Kain's throat.

"How do I know who to believe? The voice, Kain, you, you all tell me conflicting things and I no longer know what is real and what is deranged fantasy of twisted individuals!"

                The Elder God appeared to have no answer to this question. Instead, it said simply;

"You know what is right. There is no one to confirm or disprove this to you, it is simply a constant, unalterable fact that you _know_."

"Then I accept my fate." Raziel said resignedly, releasing Kain and stepping back. Kain stood up with difficulty, blood spilling from the gash in his chest. He made a show of brushing himself off, before with a growl he launched himself at Raziel. Kain's claws dug into the flesh of Raziel's neck, and he choked, coughing up blood. Flexing his right hand, Raziel brought one leg up and kicked Kain from him, and with as much strength as he could find, thrust the Soul Reaver deep into Kain's chest. The blade slid easily through flesh and bone alike, and the dull red throbbing of the blade made the blood spilling from the mortal wound appear to glow.

                Kain clutched at the insubstantial, yet deadly blade protruding from his chest, eyes wide. As his first-born withdrew the blade and stepped back solemnly, Kain fell to the floor on his knees, clutching at his wound in a vain attempt to stop the bleeding. Steadying himself with one hand when he almost fell forward, Kain retched loudly and brought up blood. He looked up to Raziel with clouded eyes, and Raziel gazed back down at his sire with a sage expression. Then, as Kain bowed his head, Raziel turned on his heel and left the temple without a word, his expression pained but once again set, as this time he looked inside himself for the truth, instead of to some outside force for guidance. Now he was certain what his destiny was, and he strode towards this barren plain with determination to fulfil his purpose.

Story concluded in the final chapter 


	6. Part 6 - Finalisation

Infinite Impossibilities

Part 6

                Raziel strode back to the pillars of Nosgoth, and swept through them without a glance, and onwards towards the obsidian temple where all his confusion had begun. With a determined scowl on his face, he entered the main chamber – the large room where he had come to his senses.

                This time, the room was lit with a dim red glow, and Raziel could now see the far walls, and the towering obsidian throne upon which the figure sat contentedly waiting for Raziel's arrival. Now the room was bathed in this light he could see the full horror of the creature from which he had unquestioningly taken his orders in the past, this monstrosity that lounged upon the imposing throne with a sneer scrawled across its hideous face. The face of the creature was smooth and black like the obsidian on which it sat, and the only feature etched upon it was a red gash of a mouth, which smiled at Raziel knowingly. The rest of the figure's body was alike the face, smooth and totally devoid of blemishes, but it was frequently broken into cracked pieces, and in between these pieces the cracks glowed with the red light of whatever was contained within that protective skin.

                Raziel flexed his claws and allowed the Soul Reaver to stream from his palm, adding a new overtone of red to the temple room, a menacing colour that dimmed and brightened alternately as the two stood in silence regarding each other.

"Did you propose to take me by surprise, Raziel?" The voice came from all around Raziel, though the mouth of the figure moved in synch. Raziel braced himself and held the Soul Reaver in front of him threateningly.

"I did not propose anything but to destroy you, beast." He said softly. The voice laughed, a deep booming sound that made Raziel's ears ring with it long after it had passed.

"It is a shame that I will have to put a stop to you, Raziel." The voice said. "I fear I would have greatly enjoyed your company had you not let yourself be dominated with visions of sainthood." The figure rose from the throne upon which it reclined, and stood looking as solid and immovable as it always had.

"You showed such potential before you let yourself be caught by Kain." The voice continued. "I feel, if he had not have contained you for long enough to destroy your sense of rational thought, that you would still be as great as you once were."

"I no longer take any heed of your false stories, nor that of any other." Raziel growled. "I need no-one to tell me who I am, for I know this: I have no fate, no imminent service that I need perform for the benefit of all. I make my own destiny, and when the time comes I will be the one to seal my own fate."

"If only you could see what a pathetic creature you have made out of yourself, Raziel." The voice intoned seriously.

                Raziel could hold back his anger no longer, and he launched himself at the figure, landing with his feet square in the centre of its chest. Raziel took hold of its great neck with one hand, and with the other he held the Soul Reaver up, ready to strike the figure full in the face. With one huge hand, the figure nonchalantly swatted Raziel away, a blow of such force that Raziel felt his neck snap with a sickening crunch. The room seemed to blur around Raziel even before he hit the stone floor, and when he looked up with disorientated eyes, he saw that he was not dead, but merely in the Spectral Plane. Bringing his left hand up to his neck, he felt the bones under the skin moving back into place slowly, and he realised that in this world his new body would draw upon the energy all around to heal itself. Pushing himself up with much difficulty, Raziel stood and surveyed his surroundings. He glanced over to the throne and drew a sharp intake of breath. The figure, insubstantial looking at first, was passing through into the Spectral Plane to pursue Raziel.

                Raziel braced himself once more, deciding that the only way to win this fight was agility, and raised the Soul Reaver in defence of himself.

"Such a shame I could not have fought with the old Raziel." The voice intoned, echoing in this strange realm. "Your pervious incarnation, im sure, would have put up more of a fight."

                Raziel said nothing, an angry scowl on his face. Lightning-fast, he rolled to one side and made a leap again at the figure, trying to take it by surprise. The figure raised one hand, palm towards Raziel, and a great but invisible force struck Raziel full in the chest, and hurled him against the far wall. Pushing himself up once more, Raziel glanced upwards and saw that a gallery ringed its way around the whole room. Frowning, he planned to use this to his advantage. Turning his back on the figure for a moment, he propelled himself upwards and caught hold of the banister edging the gallery, pulling himself over it and onto the gallery itself.

                The figure watched with seeming amusement at Raziel's actions as the vampire levelled the Soul Reaver at it and let off a burst of energy. The force projectile hit the figure in the torso, and the voice echoed around the room with laughter. Raziel scowled as he realised that nothing he could do seemed powerful enough to even put a scratch upon this being of stone.

                Not caring any more for planning attacks, Raziel leapt from the high gallery and caught hold of the figure by the shoulders, surprised that this assault overbalanced the being and brought it crashing to the floor. Seizing his opportunity, Raziel thrust the Soul Reaver at the figure lying prone on the floor before him. The Soul Reaver burnt a red trail in the air as it was brought down upon the figure's back, but Raziel started with horror as the insubstantial blade passed right through the being without seemingly harming it more than an illusion.

                Still reeling from this shock, Raziel did not move in time when one of the figure's arms shot forward and grasped Raziel around the waist with a vice-like grip. The figure righted itself, holding Raziel before it like a rag doll. The slash of a mouth on its smooth face was scowling as it regarded its former servant.

                Raziel brought his legs up and kicked at the figure's chest, trying to get away from the grip that held him firmly in place, to little avail. As much as he scrabbled and kicked and writhed, the figure paid no attention. All of a sudden, the creature released its grip upon Raziel, and he dropped to the hard obsidian floor. The figure then solemnly lifted its great foot to bring it down upon Raziel's chest, and the vampire realised in time to put up his hands in defence.

                This power struggle, Raziel could see, would not go on for long. It was plainly clear that the figure possessed a great strength that Raziel could never equal, and for a brief moment he wondered if he had indeed been tricked by the entity that Kain served into trying to attack this monstrosity. As Raziel felt the strength in his arms giving way, he heard his name shouted from on high. Raziel felt the pressure being exerted on his arms lessen slightly, as the figure that had been so intently breaking Raziel turned its attention to the creature that had invaded its domain while his mind had been occupied.

                Raziel turned his head so that he could see up onto the gallery where the figure of Kain stood leaning over the rail.

"Raziel!" Kain shouted again, and Raziel noticed that Kain's wounds from earlier were still bleeding, and that Kain himself looked deathly pale. Kain's arm moved to his side, and flung something over the rail. Raziel turned his head the other way so that he could see the blade that now protruded from the stone floor no more than an inch from his face.

                Realising after a moment that this was not in fact another attempt upon his life by his sire, Raziel took this opportunity to roll out from under the figure's foot and push himself to his feet. Grabbing the hilt of the sword, he realised that he couldn't pick it up. He looked up to Kain with wide eyes, and Kain made a motion to him that suggested he should switch to the Physical Plane. Raziel nodded curtly and willed himself to the Physical world, and with a flourish he snatched up the Soul Reaver's physical manifestation even as the figure and Kain were just starting to appear before him.

                Power surged up Raziel's arm as he grasped the two blades, and the spiritual blade flowed along the blade of the sword, making it glow with a dull red light. The figure looked at the blade with anger on its smooth face, and he turned his attention upon Kain.

"Foolish creature!" The voice shrieked as it raised its hand and unleashed a force projectile at Raziel's sire. The force of this attack flung Kain to the ground, and Raziel could hear him gasping for breath. The figure opened its great mouth and roared with a ferocity that made Raziel flinch, launching another force projectile at the platform where Kain lay prone, a force that made the dark obsidian crack and splinter off in shards that rained down on the temple floor.

                Raziel took one glance at the gallery and knew that Kain stood no chance. Grasping the Soul Reaver now with both hands, he leapt towards the figure's back and drove it as hard as he could into the hard stone shell. The stone cracked and splintered, and red light spilled forth from the wound the Soul Reaver made. A hissing noise filled the room, and Raziel withdrew the blade from the figure's body. Once more he drove it into the figure, and mustering as much force as he could he brought it upwards, leaving a great rend in the figure from which the now intense red light shone.

                The voice roared in pain, and spun around to face Raziel, causing the Soul Reaver to be torn from his hands and sent skittering across the floor. Raziel watched it with horror, and looked up into the face of the figure. A large piece of stone from the fact cracked, and dropped to the floor where it shattered with a small noise that filled echoed throughout the room. Raziel could now see into the head of the figure, and within the intense red light that seemed to be all that made up the creature, a dark sphere hung, regarding Raziel with contempt.

                The figure brought one arm up and made a clumsy attempt to hit Raziel as he ducked under it and sprinted to where the Soul Reaver lay on the floor. Snatching it up again, Raziel spun around and drove the sword once again into the creature's back. The figure collapsed on the floor, sending pieces of its hard stone shell flying, and Raziel once more plunged the sword into it, climbing up onto its back as it lay crippled before him.

                Raziel drove the sword as far as he could into the body upon which he stood, and slowly the light spilling forth from the fatal wounds dimmed and went out. Raziel then, too, collapsed, leaning on the hilt of the sword protruding from the figure's back for support.

                For a long time, Raziel sat there, contemplating what he had done. The glowing red light that had emanated from the temple's very walls had slowly gone out in the course of time, and Raziel now sat in semi-darkness, with only the red light of the Soul Reaver to illuminate the ghastly scene.

                Finally bringing himself back to his senses, Raziel stood and walked to the side of the room where the gallery had collapsed, sending Kain to the floor and bringing down the rubble on top of his wounded body. Raziel kicked away some of this rubble and pulled Kain from it, noting solemnly the peaceful look on his sire's face before he turned from it and left the temple.

*

                Raziel the Fallen sat on the platform on which stood the pillars of Nosgoth, head in his hands. As he sat, the voice of the Elder God came to him.

"Raziel, you are worthy." The voice intoned from nowhere. Raziel did not even raise his head as he let out a bitter laugh.

"You have proved yourself master of your own fate. Do you feel elated? Does it feel good to have killed a God?"

"Do not torment me." Raziel said simply.

"You have accomplished what you set out to do, Raziel. All prerequisites are now fulfilled. I am now the engine of the universe, life _and_ death, as it was foretold, and thou hast slain Kain, the one who would have been your demise."

Raziel jumped to his feet at this. "I did _not_ slay Kain!" He raged. The voice of the Elder God seemed to laugh.

"No, thou art right. You have _not_ slain Kain."

Raziel's angry expression faltered, and he stepped back slightly. "What are you trying to tell me, demon?"

But the voice was gone, and Raziel was left once again alone to contemplate his actions, and to wonder what the future held for him, if anything at all.

Little note from the author:

                Hehe, this is the first LOK fanfic ive written, and I hope its at least readable ^.^ It took me a long time to write the final chapter, I know, that's because for some reason I know _exactly_ what I was writing for the first 5, and when I got to the 6th I wondered "what am I doing?? What's going to happen?" for a few days before I actually got to writing.

                I know I've changed a lot of things and been a little bit confusing, but its kind of nice to be left wondering at the end of a story, I've found.

                I appreciate any feedback I get from this greatly! I will be writing more in the future, and I may add to this story by writing another one, but for the moment I feel that it is complete enough as a one-off.

*Hugs to all* J Melissa x


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